About Leigh Costa

“Born in Houston Texas, I was submerged in professional sports long before I could walk, talk, or recite the alphabet. Between my father Phil Costa, an attorney who worked with athletes to help secure and execute endorsement deals, and my step-father Mike Anastassiou, one of the pioneers of Home Sports Entertainment television network (HSE), I was sure to be found in either the Houston Summit at a Rockets game, or inside a live production T.V. truck at the Astrodome. At age 10, I moved to Dallas when Mike was given the opportunity to launch a popular local sports network covering the Mavs, Stars, Rangers, Spurs, Big12 and Texas high school games. During these years, local sports personalities, and talent became, and remain, part of my family.

I began my college career at the University of Oklahoma in the fall of 2004. Determined to “do my own thing”, I declared a major in Pre Physical Therapy. I was accepted to the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center a year early to simultaneously finish out my senior year of undergrad, while working on the first year of my Masters degree in Physical Therapy. After just one semester, I concluded I did not have enough passion for Physical Therapy to make it my “forever” career. I decided to return to the main campus at OU, finish out my last semester of undergrad, and study for the LSAT to give law school a shot.

After graduating from OU with a B.S. in Multidisciplinary Studies, I had 6 months until my first semester of law school began. In the interim, I was fortunate enough to be offered a part time job working with the promotions and Marketing division of Moet Hennessy. Almost immediately, I realized I thoroughly enjoyed all of the tasks associated with Sales and Marketing, and was actually pretty good at it! Needless to say, I passed on law school to pursue my passion for sales and marketing.

With my experience in sales and marketing, and extensive lifetime knowledge of sports, I landed an entry-level ad sales position at CBS Radio on 105.3 The FAN. My rapid growth and success while at CBS Radio resulted in the acquisition and perfection of necessary advertising and sports marketing skills including but not limited to, target specific schedule creation, rate negotiation, spot production and Brand/Athlete collaboration.

In May of 2014, I made the difficult decision to say goodbye to my esteemed family at CBS Radio and launch something the Metroplex had never seen: a dual sports marketing and advertising agency. Athlete and personality endorsements are standard in the marketing and advertising world these days, but how do we, the general population, learn of these athlete affiliations? Because some sort of advertising tells us so…whether it’s a billboard off the toll way with their image on it, a television commercial featuring that athlete/personality during the Mavs game, or a radio spot voiced by the endorser during your favorite sports talk show, its guaranteed that one of the many platforms of Advertising is the medium that delivers us that message. So, why not deal with one group that can secure the endorsement or partnership with the athlete or personality AND knows the ins and outs of multi media advertising to ensure that the alliance is being communicated the most effective way to reach your target audience? Costa Sports Marketing was thus created, and thanks to some of the most amazing clients, supportive family, and wonderful friends, the rest is history!”